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Archive for the ‘Global Warming’ Category

Perry running for President as a climate change denier

Posted in Air Quality, Climate Change, Global Warming, tagged , , , on July 10, 2011 |

An unnamed Republican campaign veteran told the Washington Post that Texas Governor Rick Perry has decided to run for President, though the official word from the Perry camp is still a definite maybe, stating that Mr. Perry has surveyed the field and decided to get in the race later this summer.  The thinking from republican sources  is that apparent front-runner Mitt Romney “does not reflect the Republican Party” and is therefore vulnerable to a credible challenge from the right, especially after Mr. Romney’s recent squishy remarks on global warming.  So the Texas governor is running as a climate change denier.

In a Stanford University report researches have found that “candidates running for office can gain votes by taking green positions and might lose votes by expressing skepticism about climate change.” A study entitled “The Impact of Candidates’ Statements about Climate Change on Electoral Success in 2010: Experimental Evidences,” reveals that taking a “green” position on global warming attracts votes from Democrats and Independents, while expressing skepticism about the warmist theory alienates those same voters. On the Republican side there was no significant impact either way, so it looks like Perry intends to look to his base.

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And the sun slowly sets on the Solar RPS at the Texas PUC

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , on July 8, 2011 |

Today was the last day for the Texas Public Utility Commission (PUC) to pass the 500 Mw non-wind RPS rule.  After 6 years they failed to implement a provision by passed by the legislature setting aside a portion of the state’s Renewable Portfolio Standard for renewable technologies other than wind (like solar, geothermal, or storage).  Citing cost concerns, the PUC once again failed to provide guidance and support for a group of emerging industries that needs strong government policy to get them kicked off, much like the wind energy received back in 2005, during a time when Texas currently is experiencing some of the lowest price electricity in decades.

The PUC has consistently dragged its feet, sided with the large corporate interests, offered overly complicated rules and then fail to act.   So while our leadership is yelling foul at new EPA rules that will help clean up our air, and may force us to finally shut down dirty polluting 50-year old power plants that were grand fathered in under the clean air act and expected to close decades ago, the state has failed to encourage cleaner, renewable sources of power for Texans.  Other concerns that have been expressed were whether the industry would be able to supply the needed capacity to meet this tiny goal.  This concern was being aired at the same time municipal utilities like San Antonio and Austin and electric co-ops like the PEC were committing to build projects that combined exceed the states still unleashed goal.

Traditional Generators and other vested interests are trying to keep their antiquated highly polluting fleets running and are fighting new clean energy resources.  In this instance they appear to have gained an upper hand with this commission. With Chairman Smitherman’s resignation from the PUC to take a position at the Railroad Commission (which oversees the oil and gas industry) there is an opportunity for new leadership.  Will the new commissioner be able to get anything done, only time will tell?

In the meantime, the new energy economy is finding homes in China and India (and not because they are concerned about the environment, but because it makes economic sense, while Texas rides into the 21st century on the back of a fracking gold rush that continues to feed the same industries with billion dollar tax breaks.

The price of solar is sliding down at a rapid pace and annual job growth in all sectors of this emerging industry are being reported at over 26% per year.  So where is the leadership when we need it?  Where are those whose mantra has been “Jobs, baby jobs?”  Down in San Antonio  they are making things happen while the rest of the state goes on playing the same old song of “drill, baby, drill” as we listen to our children “wheeze, baby,wheeze” and our Governor whines “Why’s the EPA always Pickin’ on me“.

As I was reminded today by one of our coworkers it was here in Texas that JFK spoke the words,  “we do these not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win…”

In a state that made a name in energy as big as Texas through its intrepid vision,  we should be leaders.  This new era brought us the largest wind industry in the country, but its potential to disrupt the status quo is sending Texas sliding back from being in the energy “bidness” to going back to being in the oil and gas “bidness”.

So we start the dance all over again and hope that the PUC opens a new rule making – while time, the world and the opportunities for jobs and new industries pass us by us by.  We now look to our cities and co-ops for leadership and innovation.   PUC Project # 35792, I bid you adieu.  May we we meet again, somewhere, sometime.  And now the sun slowly sets on our bright Texas sky.

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Texas Environmental Community Welcomes EPA Cross State Air Pollution Rule

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , on July 7, 2011 |

New EPA Safeguard will Improve Health & Lives of Millions of Americans

Earlier today, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)  announced a new Cross State Air Pollution Rule designed to protect Americans from dangerous air pollution from coal-fired power plants. The new protections will reduce power plant emissions of sulfur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) in 27 states including Texas. SO2 and NOx form soot and ground-level ozone smog which contributes to poor air quality days and respiratory illnesses affecting millions of Americans.   Texas environmental groups Sierra Club, Public Citizen, and Environmental Integrity Project welcomed the EPA’s announcement.

Dr. Neil Carman, Sierra Club’s Clean Air Program Director in Texas, a chemist and former Air Control Board investigator celebrated the announcement:

The Sierra Club applauds EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson’s landmark Cross State Air Pollution safeguard announcement today.  EPA’s actions today will help save lives and reduce dangerous air pollutants from coal-fired power plants.  Air pollution does not respect state boundaries.  As a result, air pollution created in one state can burden surrounding states with harmful pollution.  Texas coal plants are known to produce pollution that has negative consequences for the health of people both in Texas and surrounding states, particularly in eastern Oklahoma and western Arkansas.  We are especially pleased with EPA’s decision to include Texas in its proposal and to include sulfur dioxide, as Texas coal plants are at the top of the list of worst polluters in the nation.

According to the EPA, in 2005, 17 Texas coal plants emitted 531,059 tons of SO2 and 134,234 tons of NOx. By 2014, the new safeguard will reduce from 2005 levels — 303,467 tons of SO2 or 57% of SO2 and 49,814 tons of NOx or 29% of NOx.  90% of these reductions will occur at Texas coal plants.  EPA Chief Administrator Lisa Jackson today said that this rule will prevent 670-1000 premature deaths in Texas beginning in 2014.

Carman concluded, “This will result in a leap forward in reducing ozone in Texas non-attainment areas where urban areas have been struggling to clean up the air.  People living near the coal plants will definitely enjoy living with cleaner and safer air.”

TEXAS ENERGY NEEDS COVERED & COST BENEFITS

Tom ‘Smitty’ Smith, Director of Public Citizen’s Texas office spoke about the economic implications of the new EPA safeguard saying,

Concerns about meeting Texas energy needs are unfounded.  ERCOT’s most recent state of the market report along with its 2011 Report on the Capacity, Demand, and Reserves in the ERCOT Region show that we have sufficient generating capacity to meet summer peaks.  With cost effective energy efficiency measures, we can meet the electrical demand and clean the air.  Concerns about costs of this protective measure are also unfounded.  EPA found that this protection will result in a less than 1% increase on electricity bills.

We believe – and, the Texas PUC’s own Itron report, the “Assessment of the Feasible and Achievable Levels of Electricity Savings from Investor Owned Utilities in Texas: 2009-2018” shows that we can cost effectively reduce the energy needed in Texas by 23% using energy efficiency measures that are far cheaper than the cost of burning coal.   Today Texans are paying almost $6 billion a year in health care costs resulting from power plant pollution, and the insignificant cost increases that might result to consumers will be more than made up in lowered medical costs for all.  It’s time the utilities do their fair share to clean the air. The emissions controls that the utilities will be required to use are very similar to those put on every new car since the 1970s. Besides health benefits, the EPA’s safeguard supports Texas transition to a clean energy economy and green jobs.

Texas officials should convene a panel to analyze the cost of pollution upgrades at the coal plants and look at whether there are more cost-effective ways to meet our energy needs in the future.

TEXAS TRANSITION TO CLEAN ENERGY JOBS

San Antonio’s public utility, City Public Service recently announced the phase-out of its dirty old coal plant, Deely in favor of clean energy solutions and just yesterday announced a call for bids for a 400 Megawatt solar power plant.

Smith concluded, “The costs of solar are plummeting as this clean renewable energy source comes to scale.  San Antonio is leading the way to Texas clean energy future and the rest of the State should get with the clean energy program.”

A recent report published in March of 2011 by the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy found that a significant investment in energy efficiency in homes and businesses and investments in new combined heat and power capacity within the industrial sector found that some 98,600 jobs would be created over the next 20 years in Texas. An American Center for Progress Report study found that a 25% renewable energy standard by 2025 coupled with increased spending in energy efficiency through the monies earmarked for Texas through the ARRA would produce some 150,000 jobs in Texas by 2030, while a 2009 Blue-Green Alliance study found that a nationwide Renewable Energy Standard would create 60,000 new jobs in Texas over the next 10 years, including 20,000 in solar energy.

Next week, Texas environmental groups will release new data that details pollution problems at existing coal plants and underscores the importance EPA’s inclusion of Texas in this new Cross State Air Pollution rule.. 

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A dream deferred

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , on July 7, 2011 |

The Southwestern U.S. has dominated the world of utility-scale solar projects over the past few years, with news of deals being signed for solar-power plants as large as 1 gigawatt or more.  But now the Southeastern U.S. looks like it will soon be home to one of the world’s largest solar projects, a 400-megawatt photovoltaic farm being built by National Solar Power, LLC.

The next question is where.  The company has vetted a total of seven sites in three states, Florida, Georgia and North Carolina, as potential hosts for the ambitious project.  They say the sites must meet certain criteria:

1

 Having enough undeveloped land to put this farm in (ideally 4,000 acres contiguously) but because the Southeast doesn’t have the same relatively unused land resources as the Southwest, the company is looking at a different approach.  Creating the world’s largest solar farm that could be made up of as many as 20 different fields.  

2

 Appropriate economic development strategies, such as tax incentives that could include federal, state and local incentives, and financial partners.  

3

 Community support, and  

4

 A qualified work force.  

The five-year build out project is projected to cost roughly $1.5 billion.

The 1,000 megawatt Blythe Solar Power Project in California that broke ground last month is projected to create 1,000 direct jobs during construction phases and 200 permanent positions. It will also create 7,500 indirect jobs throughout the country.

So many of these opportunities are passing Texas by because the state had failed to provide incentives for them to come here.  Fortunately, Texas has some large cities with municipally owned utilities that are seeing the advantages to their communities both in terms of jobs, the ability to lure other associated industries (like PV manufacturing) to their cities, and the stablelization of their peak electric demand by investing in rooftop and utility scale solar and other renewable sources of power.

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Happy 4th of July, with or without fireworks

Posted in Climate Change, Global Warming, tagged , , on July 4, 2011 |

NOT THIS YEAR!

No oohs and aahs this Independence Day holiday in many Texas communities as months of severe drought have led to restrictions on fireworks across much of the state.

Not only are dozens of counties imposing restrictions on small pyrotechnics like firecrackers and bottle rockets, (even sparklers in some places), but cities like Austin, San Antonio, Amarillo, Lubbock, San Marcos, The Woodlands, Magnolia, Tomball, Rosenberg, Plainview, and Round Rock – to name a few – have canceled municipal Fourth of July displays because of the tinderbox conditions.

In Lubbock, temperatures remain in the triple digits without any sign of relief and wildfires this spring have already reached into the city limits and destroyed three homes.  Months without significant rain have left grasslands brown and dry, looking like the dead of winter (for our readers in the northern climes, Texas has a brown  Christmas rather than white).

Canceling the fireworks shows is causing a little bit of a stir in these communities, but it’s an extreme measure in the midst of an “exceptional” drought for the protection of the residents. One errant spark and there could be a major grass fire, as many of these communities have already experienced first hand.

Wildfires have scorched nearly 3.3 million acres of Texas since November, an area larger than the state of Connecticut. Authorities have banned outdoor fires in a record setting 235 of the state’s 254 counties.

Texas is the worst-hit of several states in a band of severe drought that stretches from Arizona to Florida. More than 90% of the state is suffering from “extreme” or “exceptional” drought conditions, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.

The “exceptional” category — the most severe — covers 72% of the state, according to figures published Thursday. Only a small patch of northeast Texas, from roughly Fort Worth to the Oklahoma state line, has seen anything close to normal rainfall.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Wednesday declared disasters in 213 Texas counties due to the drought. The move comes after a loss of pasture, grain and forage crops of more than 30% in the affected district and opens the door to federal support for farmers.

The Texas agricultural extension service estimates that state farmers have suffered $62 million in losses to fires that includes buildings, crops, livestock — and more than 4,100 miles of fences, which can cost $10,000 per mile to build.

In the West Texas oil towns of Midland and Odessa, water is getting to be as valuable as crude oil. Reservoirs managed by the Colorado River Municipal Water District are running dry, forcing the cities to impose new restrictions on water use.  The district has cut Midland’s water allocation by 20% this year, and the city’s biggest water source, the O.H. Ivie Reservoir, is projected to run dry by December 2012 unless conditions change drastically

Suffering its worst drought in more than 50 years, the Llano River is perilously close to running dry. It is the sole source of drinking water for Llano, just 75 miles north of Austin.  As I drove through the town last weekend, the Llano river was a wide, shallow shining pool on the west side of the bridge where a small dam creates the Llano City Lake, and dry river bed on the east side of the bridge, vividly demonstrating the extend of the drought.  Scattered throughout the town were signs posted showing they had moved to Stage 4 water restrictions, which in Llano means no outdoor watering at all – no lawn sprinklers, landscaping, filling of pools, even washing cars. If conditions don’t improve, Llano will more than likely move to Stage 5 restrictions soon. In Stage 5 restrictions, residential customers are limited to half of their normal water consumption and a surcharge is applied to any over usage.

In April, Gov. Rick Perry called on “Texans of all faiths and traditions” to pray for rain. But the state remains parched.

So, throughout the state, this drought has been taking its toll, but as Stephen Colbert decried on his show last week, banning fireworks on the 4th of July is unpatriotic – after all, there’s nothing more American than losing a finger and setting your neighbor’s yard on fire with one bottle rocket. 

No fireworks withstanding, hope everyone has a safe and happy 4th of July.

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The US could set a new record for billion $ weather disasters in 2011

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , on July 3, 2011 |

According to the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), we’ve already seen eight billion-dollar weather disasters since January!   Before 2011, the most billion-dollar weather disasters recorded in one full year (since 1980) is nine in 2008. This was from a wide variety of weather events including tornadoes, floods, drought, wildfires and three hurricanes.

With half the year and the peak of the hurricane season ahead of us, it’s not out of the question that this undesirable record could be reached in 2011.

From 1980 to 2010 there has been a total of 99 billion-dollar weather disasters.

Use the link below to find out what disasters in 2011 have caused damages of more than a billion dollars. It all started with a colossal winter storm.

2011 billion-dollar weather disasters

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Japan’s nuclear corporate & regulatory culture not so different from ours

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , on July 1, 2011 |

Bashing Tokyo Electric Power Co. (Tepco), has become a regular habit in Japan over the past three months. While Tepco managers certainly bungled the response to the crisis at the company’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant following the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, Tepco wasn’t operating in a vacuum.  Indications are that failures of corporate governance policies and the regulatory entity’s cozy relationship with industry contributed to the environment that left the Japanese public angered at both the Fukushima Daiichi operators and their government in the wake of the nuclear disaster that befell their country.   Japanese policy makers still are pretending Tepco is simply one bad apple, while ignoring systemic problems and the Japanese public is intent on going after Tepco.

Protests outside TEPCO shareholder meeting

Protests outside TEPCO shareholder meeting

Angry shareholders of Japan’s Tepco slammed the company for its handling of the nation’s worst ever atomic accident after the March quake-tsunami, amid calls for the firm to abandon nuclear power.  Protests were held outside the shareholder meeting on June 28th.

In the meantime, here in the US policy makers are still debating the future of nuclear power while Mother Nature keeps sending gentle reminders of the risks. Flood waters from the Missouri River breeched a damaged berm around Nebraska’s Fort Calhoun reactor  over the weekend inundating the site under several feet of water. Meanwhile, at Los Alamos, the birthplace of the atomic bomb and home to 20,000 barrels of nuclear waste, wildfires are still raging.

But back at Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), Gregory B. Jaczko, chairman of the NRC keeps telling Congress and the media that the probability of a nuclear disaster on U.S. soil similar to Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi meltdown is “very, very small.”  And the rest of the agency falls into line with federal regulators insisting that U.S. nuclear power plants are operating safely while they move forward with 12 applications for new nuclear power plans and five different reactor designs, as well as more and more applications for re-licensing of the 104 aging nuclear plants now operating. 

“At this time the agency considers that the existing emergency preparedness framework and regulations provide reasonable assurance of adequate protection of public health and safety in the event of a radiological  emergency at a US power reactor facility,” Jaczko submitted in written testimony to Congress on June 16.  But the results of a  special inspection of U.S. nuclear plants after the Fukushima disaster in Japan revealed problems with emergency equipment and disaster procedures that are far more pervasive than publicly described by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 

The NRC ordered the inspection to conduct a fast check on the equipment and procedures that U.S. plants are required to have in place in the event of a catastrophic natural disaster or a terrorist attack in response to the March earthquake and tsunami that crippled Fukushima’s reactors. 

Agency officials unveiled the results in May, stating  “out of 65 operating reactor sites, 12 had issues with one or more of the requirements during the inspections.”  But an closer examination of the reports from those inspections by ProPublica found that 60 plant sites had deficiencies that ranged from broken machinery, missing equipment and poor training to things like blocked drains or a lack of preventive maintenance. Some of the more serious findings include:

While the deficiencies don’t pose an immediate risk and are relatively easy to fix, critics say they could complicate the response to a major disaster and point to a weakness in NRC oversight.

In a summary attached to the inspection findings even the NRC expressed some concern.

“While individually, none of these observations posed a significant safety issue, they indicate a potential industry trend of failure to maintain equipment and strategies required to mitigate some design and beyond design-basis events,” the summary says.

The special inspection covered equipment and procedures for use in disasters that are beyond the scope of the plant’s design — major earthquakes, tornadoes, floods, hurricanes and terrorist attacks.

The Fukushima accident has focused the NRC’s attention on the risk that a natural disaster or attack could knock out a plant’s safety systems for an extended period and lead to a radiation release.

Although all plants are designed to withstand natural disasters, U.S. nuclear facilities are aging. Recent studies have shown that earthquake risks are actually higher than they were predicted when some plants were built, although the NRC says reactors can still withstand the highest expected quake (but that’s what Japan thought). Now historic flooding on the Missouri River is testing design limits at two Nebraska plants.

So keep this in mind, like the reports coming from Tepco and the Japanese government after the problems started at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, NRC’s jargon-laden communiques freqently reflect what the operator has reported, and do little to shed light on any issues or events occurring at nuclear power plants throughout our country.  When the agency says that America’s 104 operating nuclear power plants are being inspected to deal with power loss or damage that might follow an “extreme” event, keep in mind the NRC’s loosening of standards over the years at the industry’s urging and the other policies put in place because of the agency’s cozy relationship with the industry.  The nuclear industry here in the US is not so different from Japan’s.  Whose heads will we want if there is some catastrophic failure at one of our own plants?

The full report of lessons learned from the Fukushima incident will arrive on July 19. For now, the world’s other 336 other radioactive reactors are also being pushed by the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to launch a series of national safety tests backed by international inspections.

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Nowhere to run

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , on July 1, 2011 |

In a series of investigative stories, the Associated Press (AP) has been reporting on the state of the US nuclear industry in the wake of the Fukushima disaster in Japan.  In this recent report, the AP found that as America’s nuclear power plants have aged, the once-rural areas around them have become far more crowded and much more difficult to evacuate.

Even as nuclear plants run at higher power, posing more danger in the event of an accident, populations around the facilities have swelled as much as 4½ times since 1980.  At the same time estimates of evacuation times have not been updated in decades.  Emergency plans would direct residents to flee on antiquated, two-lane roads that clog hopelessly at rush hour. And evacuation zones have remained frozen at a 10-mile radius from each plant since they were set in 1978.

With about 120 million people, almost 40 percent of all Americans, living within 50 miles of a nuclear plant (using 2010 Census data) this scenario smacks of human tragedy, for any nuclear accident in this country.

Click here to read this segment of AP’s investigative study of Nuclear Power in America.

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The Korea Trade Deal in Two Minutes

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , , , on June 29, 2011 |

Check out this two-minute film from Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch about the job-killing NAFTA-style Korea trade deal.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMyQ4OR44pg]

Or, if film isn’t your thing, read the script below. It is replete with links to images and underlying documents. And, if this makes you mad, do something about it. Click here to go to our action page.

Script:

It is heartbreaking, but true: After campaigning against more job-killing NAFTA-style trade agreement, President Obama has adopted Bush’s Korea trade deal.

It is opposed by labor, consumer, environmental and family farm organizations. The Chamber of Commerce and multinational corporations love it.

NAFTA with Korea is projected to cost 159,000 more American jobs and increase our trade deficit. Losers under this deal: the jobs of the future; solar and wind energy; mass transit equipment and more.

NAFTA with Korea is celebrated by the Wall Street firms who wrecked our economy. No doubt, it limits financial regulation.

NAFTA with Korea is opposed by many in Korea because of its financial deregulation and because it would allow up to 65% Chinese parts to go into “Korean” exports to the US–killing Korean jobs.

The Korea deal has the outrageous NAFTA-style provisions that empower multinational corporations to skirt our court systems and directly attack our state and federal laws before World Bank and UN tribunals to demand compensation from us taxpayers for any policies they say undermine their future expected profits. Under trade deals, this system has been used to attack toxics bans, forestry and mining laws, land use and zoning rules — even domestic court rulings.

NAFTA with Korea could also undermine our national security. The sanctions we have to keep the North Korea dictatorship from obtaining hard currency to build up its weapons systems would be undermined. A loophole in the deal would deliver billions to the North Korean regime. It allows goods assembled in South Korea but comprised of parts from the notorious Kaesong North Korea sweatshop zone to obtain special access to our market.

We can stop NAFTA with Korea by ensuring a majority in Congress vote against it. Opposition to more NAFTAs is one of the few issues that unite Americans across the political spectrum. You can make the difference visit www.citizen.org/korea to learn how you can take action to stop the Korea Trade Deal.

 
 Follow Lori Wallach on Twitter: www.twitter.com/PCGTW

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Air pollution: An environmental justice issue for Hispanics

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , , , on June 29, 2011 |

There are two main causes of air pollution—diesel engines and coal-fired power plants—both of which are prevalent in Texas.  And these neighborhood contaminants are having grave consequences, particularly on Hispanics in Texas and the rest of the country. 

Because of work or housing availability, Hispanics across the country tend to live near some of the most polluted areas of the country.  In both urban neighborhoods and rural areas, 65 percent of Hispanics live in areas where the air fails to meet federal standards.   According to the Clean Air Task Force, Hispanics take in approximately one-and-one-half times the levels diesel exhaust of the average American, resulting in anywhere between 2,000 to 5,000 premature deaths in the Hispanic community annually. Additionally, Hispanics are 3 times as likely as whites to die from asthma.

Coal-fired power plants are among the biggest polluters in the country and 15 percent of Hispanics live within 10 miles of one.  But it is not only poor air quality that threatens Hispanic neighborhoods.  A recent report released by the Sierra Club indicated that mercury—emitted from coal-fired power plants—is present in high levels in rivers and streams that Hispanics fish. Pregnant women are especially susceptible to the harmful effects of eating contaminated fish because mercury poisoning contributes to babies being born with learning disabilities, developmental delays and cerebral palsy.

A 2007 University of Texas study revealed that children who lived within a 2 mile radius of the Ship Channel in Houston had a 56 percent higher chance of having leukemia than those living elsewhere, and this area of Houston has a large Hispanic population.

The impact on health translates into increased pressure on families juggling caring for a sick family member and their jobs, increased costs to the family from emergency room visits and medication for chronic conditions, all these things are a tremendous burden on families and workers.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sets air quality standards by setting maximum levels of common air pollutants, which include ozone, particles, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide and lead, which can be present in the air over a set period of time. They also measure for other contaminants that the EPA calls toxic, such as mercury.  States then enforce these standards by issuing permits and

Currently in Texas, when a polluter applies for an air quality permit, the state environmental agency (the Texas Commission for Environmental Quality – TCEQ) looks only at projected air emission levels from that specific plant.  There is no requirement that they look at the cumulative impacts on air quality and efforts to address cumulative impacts failed to pass in the Texas legislature this past session.  This leaves communities dealing with the cumulative impacts of air pollution from several different sources with little recourse, because without one specific polluter, individual families can’t take legal action against companies.

From coast to coast, Hispanics are banding together in a growing environmental justice movement insisting that not only should the earth be protected but also people should be treated equally around environmental issues.  Industry threatens that increasing regulation to protect citizens will cost jobs, but jobs are a poor exchange for the loss of a loved one.  One way to address the current inequities is to VOTE YOUR INTERESTS.  Keeping local, state or federal candidates’ stances on environmental issues in mind when election time rolls around can impact air pollution in your community.

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Some U.S. Reactors on Borrowed Time

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , , , on June 28, 2011 |

Global Support for Nuclear Power Drops

A new Ipsos/Reuters poll released on June 22nd reveal that global support for nuclear power has plummetted in the wake of the Fukushima disaster. A survey of over 19,000 people in 24 countries showed that three quarters of people now think nuclear power will soon be obsolete.  Only three countries still show support for nuclear power: the U.S., India and Poland.

Recent investigative reporting shows that the relative safety of nuclear power in the U.S. is tenuous, despite what some politicians have claimed. A big problem is that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has been working with the nuclear power industry to keep our country’s reactors operating within safety standards, but they’ve been doing it by either weakening those standards, or not enforcing them at all. A year-long investigation by the Associated Press (AP) revealed that the NRC has extended licenses for dozens of aging U.S. nuclear plants despite their having multiple problems, like rusted pipes, broken seals, failed cables and leaking valves. When such problems are found, the NRC will weaken the standards to help the plants meet them instead of ordering them to be repaired to meet current standards. The nuclear industry argues that the standards they are violating are “unnecessarily conservative,” so the NRC simply loosens the standards.

Just last year, the NRC weakened the safety margin for acceptable radiation damage to nuclear reactor vessels — for the second time. Through public record requests to the NRC, the AP obtained photographs of badly rusted valves, holes eaten into the tops of reactor vessels, severe rust in pipes carrying essential water supplies, peeling walls, actively leaking water pipes and other problems found among the nation’s fleet of aging nuclear reactors.

Fukushima has been a wake up call about the dangers of nuclear power, and some countries are heeding the information. But it seems the U.S. is lagging behind when it comes to this issue. Light-to-absent coverage of TEPCO’s struggles to bring Fukushima under control, legislators who insist on acting favorably towards the nuclear power industry despite the deteriorated state of our current reactor fleet and an ineffective Nuclear Regulatory Commission have all contributed to a bad combination of a dangerous situation and a complacent American public on this issue.

This combination of lax regulations and questionable maintenance at US nuclear facilities is especially concerning with the flooding that two Nebraska nuclear plants are now facing from the swollen Missiouri River. 

Here in Texas, the first hearing to determine what issues would be addressed in the Sustaninable Energy and Economic Development (SEED) Coalition’s intervention in the re-licensing application of the South Texas Nuclear plant in Matagorda County happened Monday.  There are indications that the NRC is being more mindful that they appear more concerned with safety issues in the relicensing process, but we will see whether this is window dressing or if the agency is going to apply some lessons learned from Fukushima to our country’s relicensing process as this application moves forward.

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Grand Canyon, preserved

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , on June 27, 2011 |

UPDATE

A while back we wrote about a uranium-mining ban that was about to expire in the area surrounding the famous U.S. landmark and one of the seven wonders of the natural world – the Grand Canyon.  Thanks to Arizona resident Suzanne Sparling who led the charge to extend it, collecting 50,000 public comments, last Monday, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced his support for another 20-year ban on the dangerous practice.

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Houston Pleas for Smarter Water Usage in the Wake of Drought

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , on June 22, 2011 |

Summer has barely set in and the City of Houston has issued stage one conservation measures in the wake of the current drought in Texas:

City of Houston Implements Stage One Water Conservation Measures

Lack of rain and record high temperatures that have plagued 98 percent of the state have made it necessary for the City of Houston to institute Stage One Water Conservation Measures, as outlined in the city’s code.

Houston is asking its residents to limit lawn watering to the hours of 8:00 p.m. and 10:00 a.m. and NO more than two days per week.

Residents are asked to abide by the following schedule:

  • Sundays and Thursdays for customers with even-numbered street addresses
  • Saturdays and Wednesdays for customers with odd-numbered street addresses

The City will also be contacting large commercial water customers to request voluntary reductions in their water consumption.

City departments are instituting a water use reduction program which includes but is not limited to:

  • Reducing water use by 10 percent
  • Implementing corrective measures to eliminate water waste

While the City of Houston currently has adequate water capacity to meet the demands of its customers, the following tips can also help our customers be good water stewards during one of the most severe droughts in Texas history and into the future in a state where water is a precious and finite resource:

  • Keep showers under five minutes
  • Remember to turn water off while brushing your teeth
  • Wash only full loads of dishes or clothes
  • Replace older model showerheads and older faucet aerators with new low-flow ones, and install water conservative toilets
  • Inspect toilets for silent leaks by putting food coloring in the toilet tank. If colored water leaks into the toilet bowl before it is flushed, water is being lost due to a worn flapper.

If you live in Houston and want more information on the city’s water conservation measures, please contact Alvin Wright at Alvin.Wright@houstontx.gov or call 832.395.2455.

The restrictions are the latest prompt in the series of drought related events and measures ranging from Rick Perry’s plea for divine intervention and the recent decision by the LCRA to extend the debate and final vote to approve a contract giving a water to the poorly planned White Stallion Energy Center.

The issuance by the city emphasizes personal responsibility in the face of questionable water availability and residents throughout the state should consider implementing water saving measures even in times were rain isn’t a distant memory.  Some utility companies offer incentives for installing low-flow systems, and conversion kits continue to get cheaper, so purchasing them at any time could reduce your monthly costs and help out the environment too.

Consider, purchasing a rain barrel to capture water when it does rain.  This can keep your gardening investments more viable in times of drought.  Consider landscaping decisions such as xeriscaping (using drought tolerant plants that need less water even in times when drought is not a consideration, and reduces some of you landscape maintenance), minimizing lawn space in favor of beds for plants or replacing thirstier grasses like the very popular St. Augustine for more drought resistant varieties.

Everyone knows Texas weather is one of the more unpredictable things in the world, so carefully monitoring and rationing water usage at all times is most definitely a good decision.

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NRC testimony inspires fear, not confidence, in US nuclear power plant safety

Posted in Global Warming, tagged , , on June 18, 2011 |

In an earlier blog we mentioned the hearings on Capitol Hill being held by the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works on the implications of Japan’s nuclear accident for the United States.  Besides the concern that the nation’s nuclear safety rules had failed to consider the possibility of losing both off-site power from the electric grid and on-site emergency diesel generators. (NRC Commissioner George Apostolakis said that this condition produces a station blackout, and the commission has a rule covering such blackouts, but Mr. Jaczko said that the thrust of the statement was that the agency had not thought enough about a single event that would damage both the grid and the diesel backup generators, causing a plant to take longer to recover), there was testimony about the spent fuel rods.

At Fukushima, the spent fuel rods stored on site posed as grave a threat as the reactor cores. They are packed with uranium, are very unstable and generally not well-protected. NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko, when asked by Sen. Tom Carper about the spent fuel pools in the United States, admitted that “we have not given that enough attention.”

Jaczko also said that until Fukushima, the NRC had never really considered the possibility that multiple reactors or even multiple plants could fail at the same time, due to some sort of large-scale natural disaster or other event. “Our traditional approach has always been to assume a single incident at a single reactor,” he said. “Clearly Fukushima-Daiichi showed us that we have to consider the possibility of multiple units at a single site, perhaps multiple spent fuel pools being affected at the same time.”

Commissioners also had no answers about how to fix backup power systems so that they continue to cool nuclear material in the event of a major power outage. The batteries at Fukushima ran for only eight hours, in the United States, the standard length is only four hours.  NRC commissioner George Apostolakis testified that he was not sure what action would/could be taken to address the problem.

Amidst these less-than-inspiring answers, larger questions loom about nuclear regulation. The NRC has frequently been criticized as too close to the nuclear industry (not unlike Japan’s admission in a draft report to the IAEA, that its nuclear regulator was run by a ministry, which has been the chief promoter of nuclear energy for decades – click here to read our earlier blog on the IAEA report).

During the 2008 campaign, President Obama, while promoting nuclear energy as the electric power source of our future, called the NRC “a moribund agency…captive of the industry it regulates,” but little was done to bring it back to it’s primary mandate of being the watchdog for nuclear safety.  Rather, the NRC has been more of a cheerleader for the industry, even after the Fukushima disaster.  A Wall Street Journal MarketWatch article highlights this point:

The Obama administration is considering whether to intervene in a legal dispute between Entergy Corp and Vermont over continued operation of the state’s only nuclear plant, two officials familiar with the matter said Thursday.

At issue is whether the state has the authority to block Entergy’s bid to continue operating the Vermont Yankee plant beyond March 2012. Typically, federal regulators have jurisdiction over the licensing of nuclear reactors.

During a Senate hearing Thursday, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) and Kristine Svinicki, a member of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said the Justice Department is weighing whether to intervene in the case.

“The litigation posture of the United States is under active deliberation by the Justice Department and they’ve asked that in our testimony today we not comment any further,” Svinicki said, citing an exchange between her staff and the department.

A Justice Department spokesman declined to comment.

Sanders also said the Justice Department had consulted the five-member nuclear commission about the issue and that on Wednesday, commission had privately voted, 3-2, in favor of federal intervention in the case. None of the commissioners would confirm the specifics of that vote, citing the need to keep legal matters private.

Another member of the commission, William Ostendorff, said the discussions between the Justice Department and the nuclear agency were “a matter of whether or not the NRC has an interest in this case, dealing with pre-emption issues.”

“The political reality is that the DOJ is going to have to make a decision,” Sanders responded. Earlier in the hearing, he told the commissioners, “in my very strong opinion, it is not your business to get involved in that fight.”

Entergy wants to extend the life of its Vermont Yankee plant beyond March 2012, but has run into opposition to nuclear reactors that has escalated across the country following a nuclear crisis in Japan and revelations about potentially inadequate disaster preparedness at nuclear plants in the U.S.

Both the nuclear industry and regulators have said they will make changes as a result of the events in Japan. At the hearing Thursday, the NRC members again said they expect to tighten rules governing backup power for nuclear plants.

At the same time, the regulators have not backed away from their normal business of reviewing license extensions and new reactor designs.

In March, the NRC gave the green light to Entergy, approving operations at Vermont Yankee for another 20 years. But when Entergy bought the Vermont facility in 2002, it agreed to give state regulators say over the license extension.

The state passed a law in 2006 requiring Vermont legislators to approve the extension. Now, Entergy says that law invalidates their agreement and the decision should be up to federal regulators.

Senator Sanders (I-VT) repeatedly criticized the commissioners on this point during the hearings, urging them to step back from the issue. “If the state of Vermont chooses energy efficiency and sustainable energy for its future, instead of an aging and trouble-ridden nuclear power plant, it is not the place of the NRC to prevent us from doing that,” he told them. “The NRC’s mandate is very clear. Its concerns begin and end with safety. It is not supposed to be the arbiter of political or legal disputes between a $14 billion dollar energy company and the people of Vermont.”

To view the archived webcast of the hearing, click here.

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White Stallion Coal Plant Fails to Obtain Water Contract

Posted in Climate Change, Coal, Energy, Global Warming, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 15, 2011 |

Lake Travis Levels Plummeted During 2009 Drought

Today the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) Board of Directors delayed a vote on providing water to the “White Stallion” coal plant proposed for Matagorda County. Though White Stallion’s Chief Operation Officer, Randy Bird, was expecting and asking for approval of a contract today, the board chose to delay action until August 10. This makes sense considering that they were confronted with more than 30 people who signed up to speak against the coal plant, some driving from as far away as the Gulf Coast (some taking off work) in order to be there. This delay is a victory for those opposing the coal plant and a step in the right direction in convincing the LCRA that this project is not a beneficial or responsible use of water from the Colorado River Basin.

Key concerns included the general aspect of this project and the negative effects it would have on the people, environment (and watershed) of the region. There were also, as expected, many concerns regarding the current drought and many agreements that the last thing LCRA should consider is adding more, firm water commitments particularly when LCRA is already asking customers to conserve and scale back their water use. Concerns about how global warming would further worsen dry conditions in the region over the next 55 years (the length of the proposed contract) were also voiced by many of the speakers.

“Even though they haven’t denied it yet, we’re glad they’re taking their time to look into the serious implications of this coal plant request” said Lydia Avila with Sierra Club.  “We’re confident that when they look at the facts they will realize this is a bad deal for Texans and reject it.”

Only one or two people spoke in favor of granting the contract, one of whom was Owen Bludau, Executive Director of the Matagorda County Economic Development Corporation – one of the original entities that worked to bring the White Stallion proposal to Bay City. Those speaking against the contract included Matagorda County Judge Nate McDonald, Burnet County Judge Donna Klaeger, David Weinberg (Executive Director of the Texas League of Conservation Voters), Doctor Lauren Ross (who recently released this report on how White Stallion would affect water in the Colorado watershed), and many others including concerned residents throughout the LCRA region and landowners located right next to the proposed plant site.

Public Citizen applauds LCRA’s decision to table this vote. It shows that the LCRA takes the concerns of their stakeholders seriously. The next two months should prove to the LCRA that this coal plant is both unnecessary and a waste of our most precious and dwindling resource: our water.

Update and thank you!

Public Citizen wants to thank all of you who responded to our emails, blogs, tweets and phone calls and either called, mailed, or emailed comments in, and to those who showed up and packed the meeting room today.  This decision would probably have been very different if you had not made your concerns know to the board.  You are all awesome!

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